By Al Fasoldt
Copyright © 1991, The Syracuse Newspapers
I got a review copy of a new DAT recording in the mail the other
day.
It arrived eight years late.
Don't blame the post office; the tape was mailed out a few days
before I got it.
Blame the hi-fi industry instead. The companies that make our
audio components have been sitting on their hands for nearly a
decade.
Why did they wait so long to bring us digital audio tapes that
we can play in our homes? The answer could fill a book. We'll
skip the background and get right to the point.
Digital audio tape recorders have been around for a long time.
I made my first digital tape recording eight years ago. I used
a PCM (pulse-code modulation) adapter plugged into my VCR. The
adapter changed the digital signals into video frames.
PCM adapters became very popular at radio stations and recording
studios and are still in wide use at sites like that. But they
were designed for home use, and the hi-fi industry people I talked
to back in 1983 said it wouldn't be long before audiophiles around
the country had PCM units cabled into their VCRs.
Toshiba even came out with a VCR that had a PCM processor built
in. And Mobile Fidelity Sound Lab, the company that became famous
creating remastered versions of best-selling LPs, even issued
a bunch of digital recordings on videotape in the PCM format.
But home digital recording was a dodo in the '80s. PCM adapters
cost too much for the average buyer ($800 to $1,500 or so), and
good cassette decks were cheap. The best cassette decks were getting
better all the time as Dolby C and dbx noise-reduction were introduced.
Even VCRs turned into audio gems. VHS Hi-Fi gave results almost
as good as digital, at a much cheaper price.
Late in the decade, the Japanese electronics giants came up with
a new kind of digital recorder. It used a tiny tape and had a
great sound quality. But threats of lawsuits from American music
publishers, worried that digital recorders would make piracy more
common, kept the Japanese from bringing these recorders to North
America for three years.
And now they are here. The new DAT (digital audio tape) recorders
can be purchased at most electronics and hi-fi dealers.
But the public doesn't seem to care. Maybe it's because a lot
of savvy audiophiles realize that Philips and Tandy are about
to sell a better and cheaper digital recorder-one that can also
play and record regular cassettes.
Maybe it's because common sense tells us that recordable compact
discs are just around the corner. Why buy a digital tape recorder
when a laser disc recorder makes so much more sense?
And maybe it's just a matter of weariness. Some things just plain
change too quickly in today's world of consumer technology. It's
hard enough to keep up with everything as it is.
That's how I feel. And that's why the little DAT tape that came
in the mail will have to sit there a while. It may even sit there
forever. By the time I'm ready for DAT, it might be nothing but
a has-been.
And so, like you, I'm waiting and watching.
technofile:
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